


During that time on Coruscant...

by Gabriel4Sam



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Attack of the Clones AU, Bittersweet Ending, F/M, Fix-It, M/M, Minor Character Death, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-04
Updated: 2018-05-04
Packaged: 2019-04-26 18:42:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14408190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gabriel4Sam/pseuds/Gabriel4Sam
Summary: Protecting Dormé, acting as Padmé' s decoy, and investigating the would be assassin with Captain Typho  in the day, and learning more about some interesting Naboo's ideas about love in the nights, Obi-Wan is certainly  having an interesting time on Coruscant, when Anakin is busy flirting with Padme on Naboo.





	During that time on Coruscant...

**Author's Note:**

> Billystarpip did a wonderful work as a beta, thank you so, so much for your help!

Coruscant! Jewel of the Deep Core! The planet City that never slept, the world where everything could happen and the path of the galaxy was decided!

And on it, the Senate District, the most prestigious neighbourhood, with the most important galactic institutions, more powerful conglomerate, and with building like the 500 Republica. Here lived the Chancellor himself, a lot of Senators, music stars, genius inventors…even famous courtesans, who of course, bore less controversial titles…

Here lived the Senator of a faraway world: Senator Padmé Amidala from Naboo, who had attained fame as a teenage queen when her world had been invaded and whose name was  on all lips with her opposition to the building of the war machine the Republic needed to defend itself.

Or thought it needed to defend itself.

Late in the night, there were still rooms lit in Senator Amidala’s apartments. One of those light was a blue suspension, a complicated flower glass with too much glitter like only a Naboo artist could invent, and that suspension was over a desk where Captain GregarTypho was working, five different holopads on the desk and a frown on his face. Whatever he was working on, it didn’t seem as a success and with a sigh, he finally collected them, putting them into a drawer that he locked with his digital print. He stood up, stretched slowly, then took his blaster from his holster, searched for his cleaning kit and sat down again on a chair nearer the window, where he started to take apart the blaster to clean it.

The open window let into the room the noises of Coruscant. So high it was essentially aircraft noises, but it didn’t seem to register with the man. He was grumbling, his frown more pronounced from minute to minute, his only eye hard and unfriendly. When Dormé, handmaiden of Senator Amidala, Naboo’s operative, and current decoy of said Senator, entered the room, he immediately asked :“Clawdite assassin, poisonous kouhuns, Jedi Knights throwing themselves out our windows…In what sort of galaxy are we living?”

“You mean if we compare to Naboo, peaceful Naboo, where you lost your eye during the invasion?” She answered, as always quick to the repartee.

He smiled, despite himself, and looked at her, even if his hands never stopped his precise work when he detailed his thoughts: 

“With a battle droid, I’m sure things aren’t about to go mystical. No offense to the Jedi in the living room, but I prefer the Senator safe on Naboo, even with his presence here. On Naboo, the Security Force will filtrate people accessing the lake house, she shouldn’t depend on the young Jedi to be safe. The Force! How can I trust the Force to protect her, when I don’t understand it? They are not infallible, no more than me, that poor guy who died in the plasma power plant of Theed was the proof of that.”

Dormé took off her outer robe, a heavy thing in a purple brocade with black lace trimmings, which she abandoned on the sofa. She sat down and took off her shoes with a satisfied sigh. Even if she wore flat, practical shoes when impersonating the Senator, trusting on the long dress to hide them, she had been on her feet all day chitchatting Senators and they were killing her.

Next to her, he was still working on his weapon and only when he had successfully assembled back the weapon, did she steal a tender kiss and then asked

“Representative Binks got back to his apartment without troubles?”

“Yes, the guards pinged half an hour ago with the confirmation.” He turned to face her better and took her hand, kissing the back of it in an almost automatic gesture. Lines of stress were around her eyes, aging her. Like him, she had taken terribly hard the death of poor Cordé three days ago. It had been her idea to have one of the handmaidens impersonate the Senator during the travel to Coruscant and no, not only was she grieving, she was feeling guilty. The other handmaiden had been more than their colleague, she had been their friend for years;Dormé first, since they were young, as they came of the same part of Naboo, a small town high in the mountains, and Gregar after, when he had taken of the role of Security Chief for Amidala, succeeding his uncle. In fact, Cordé had been Gregar’s friend before he even was friends with Dormé.

“It would be so much easier if he took rooms in the building.” The young woman complained, her mind stuck on Representative Jar-Jar Binks. She liked the Gungan but his stubbornness to refuse to live in the 500 Republica, as secure as the Senate itself, was complicating things for the security service. 

“His building is billing him half the price Senator Amidala pay here and with that money, how many Gungans did he send to Theed University?”

“It wouldn’t a problem if people did recognize Gungans’ schools as they should.”

“Well, the galaxy is a speciest place, but it’s a discussion we already have had dozen of time, dear heart, and we won’t solve it tonight.”

“You’re right. Perhaps it’s Cordé’s fate: today, I seemed ready to pick fight with the galaxy itself. I wanted to yell at the Senator when she refused that Ellé accompanied her. Even if it’s because she wants me with the best protection when I pretend to be her in that pit of snakes. Speaking of protection- where is our esteemed Jedi guest?”

“Knight Kenobi is…well, he’s kneeling in the living room and looking as friendly as a stone statue so I left him alone. Do you want help for the rest of the costume?”

“Well, Motée helped me with the headdress, which is the most torturous part of this outfit- you should see the spikes, I swear you could murder a Mandalorian without even dulling them when you pierce the armour-but I thought you could help me with the dress. Perhaps even with what’s beneath.”

A laugh escaped him, erasing years off his face, and it almost surprised him. Life had been grim those last two months, with few occasions for laugh.

“Don’t Jedi…you know?” He had an evocative eyebrow move.

“Don’t Jedi what?” Dormé asked, smiling, charmed despite herself by his ridiculous eyebrow game. He could be pretty silly, her serious Captain, and she loved that with her, he could drop the act of mindless drone only preoccupied of his duty and be simply Gregar Typho, a man of Naboo with a sweet tooth, way too many relatives and terrible taste in holonovels.

“Sense that? If we frolic all night, will Knight Kenobi sense it with the Force? Because that could be awkward tomorrow at breakfast.”

“If they were disturbed every time a couple had sex a few room over, I suppose they would never leave their Temple, no? Do Jedi even have sex?”

“No idea, he’s the first I’ve met. If they don’t, it’s a shame. I’m pretty sure you could do fun stuff with the Force.”

He kissed her again, and again, and again, before standing up with her in his arms and going in search of their bed. From kisses to kisses, the world left them alone for a few hours, a welcome moment of calm the overworked Captain used to investigate exactly what his lover was wearing under the dress (not a lot) and to catch much needed sleep, entwined with her.

They would need all their energy the next day. Like every day. Serving Naboo was not exactly an easy job in these troubled time.

 

The next morning, the other handmaidens, Ellé and Motée, threw Gregar out of the room at first light, ready to help Dormé dress to impersonate the Senator.

“I have already seen her naked you know! She has three moles on her right chee- ” He was still protesting, amused, when he turned and saw Knight Kenobi, so red it was difficult to distinguish where the skin ended and where his ginger hair started.

The other man said nothing and Gregar, internally swearing, gave an awkward shrug. A stray thought passed in his mind, the curiosity about that blush and about how much of the Jedi it covered and he hoped the mind-reading quality of those strange monks was only a rumour.

“Perhaps we could begin with our investigation by pooling together our resources?” He proposed. “They need almost two hours for Dormé to be ready, as they will go heavy on the painting and headdress to help our charade.”

“I didn’t think Naboo’s Senators wore as heavy make-up as your Queens do,” The Jedi immediately answered, probably grateful to escape the subject of a naked Dormé, her moles and their exact emplacement.

“Traditionally, they don’t, but most Senators aren’t exactly observant or well-versed in other planets cultures. Not as Jedi are.” He complimented with an inclination of his head.

To his surprise, Kenobi’s cheeks coloured again then the ginger Jedi threw himself in his theories about their dead would-be assassin.

“The result of the autopsy of our Clawdite would-be  assassin should be ready in the afternoon. Perhaps you could read me into the precedent attempts on the Senator’s life, Captain? I suppose you’re trying to identify the provenance of the money to put some names into the light?”

“Please, call me Gregar. Every time someone call me Captain, I think my uncle is watching over my shoulder for every mistake I could make.”

The Jedi seemed surprised for a second. Didn’t people ask the Jedi to be on a first name basis with them? The expression of surprise passed, replaced by a smile, so natural, so different than the trained one Kenobi had offered when meeting him two days before. It was like seeing the dawn for the first time.

“It would be my pleasure, Gregar, but only if you call me Obi-Wan,” he answered, his voice warm.

“Obi-Wan it is. Come, my office is that way. We, of course, conducted intensive investigations about the attempted murders but it was always a dead-end. Once, I thought we could find something more but there were only dead bodies once we found the alleged masterminds. I know there are bias against Security Force from backwaters planets, Outer Rim worlds like Naboo…”

“I beg you to believe I don’t support those bias, Gregar. The fact that you didn’t unmask anyone is in my opinion no fault of yours. Someone is covering their tracks very well.” Obi-Wan said with a frown. “Too well. I have the most respect for the Naboo’ security forces. I saw you working years ago. You should have unmasked everything. No offense to the Senator, but she isn’t a target so big you should be confronted with people capable of resisting your investigations.”

“Yes.” Gregar simply acquiesced, as they sat down, and he started his terminal to retrace his work for Obi-Wan.

******

That evening, Senator Padmé Amidala was supposed to appear to the fundraiser organized by Fang Zar, Senator of the Sern sector, for a charity he was sponsoring. Dressed in enough layers that she could have been three times Padmé size under it with nobody the wiser, bejewelled, with a headdress so complicated one hour had been needed, and painted in red and white, Dormé was unrecognizable and grumbling under her breath when the shuttle came for them. She gratefully accepted the hand of Obi-Wan to step inside.

“I will be one step behind every minute, my lady,” the Jedi promised. “Nothing will happen to you.”

“Apart a little vexation?” She quipped, perhaps a little less nicely than she would have if she hadn’t been carrying double her weigh in clothes.

“My lady?”

“You offered your first name to my lover but not to me?” And this time, the amusement was more present.

“I will be one step behind you and I will kick the  ass of anyone trying to hurt you, Dormé,” he immediately shot  back, accentuating the name and she couldn’t stop a small laugh at his choices of words.

She could see the profile of Gregar in  the pilot seat and he was smiling too.

In her opinion, few things were more painful than Senator’s parties. It was hot, there were too many people, and the food was complicated little things that were almost always disgusting and too small to be filling but supposed to be _in_ _._ and If Senators were too prudent to predatorily leer at her when she was impersonating Padmé, thank the stars, for she had needed to put a few of them in their places at times, when she had gone as herself, a simple handmaiden.

She soldiered on and made small talk, carefully copying Padmé’s cadence of speech. Fang Zar wasn’t always of the same political line as Padmé, but as the galaxy spiralled into madness, they found each other reliable political allies more and more, and it was important for Naboo that they showed their support to his charity projects.

She had studied so many holopads these last few days that she wasn’t exactly sure what this charity event was for, but she was almost as good as any politician to talk in circles if needed.

Obi-Wan stayed one step behind her every moment, a silent, beige shadow, and nobody remarked on his presence: everybody already knew about the attempted murders. People treated him as he didn’t exist and while not exactly surprising, Dormé found that a little disturbing.

Later, when the dancing started, she made the mistake of accepting the invitation of Meena Tills, Senatorial aids of Senator Tikkes. Everybody knew the Senator would throw his lot with the Separatists if the crisis evolved in a war and he hadn’t set foot on Coruscant for months. The young Mon Calamari had been working hard to assure people that her employer’s opinion didn’t reflect the Mon Calamari’s or Quarren’s and, while working with Dormé, Cordé, and the other handmaiden doubling as Padmé’s aides, she had become a good friend. Of course, the poor Mon Calamari was distressed and wanted to express her condolences to Senator Amidala in person, Dormé being officially on Naboo right now.

Not only did Dormé have to endure condolence for Cordé’s murder, when she desperately wanted to forget about it even for a few hours, she couldn’t even do it as herself. Padmé was nothing more than a passing acquaintances with Meena and Dormé struggled to keep her voice even and business like during their entire conversation.

“If I can cut in,” a voice suddenly intervened and she hadn’t time to understand what was happening. A moment later, she was dancing with Obi-Wan. His footing was perfect, which didn’t surprise her, and he guided her effortlessly when she fought to control her need to rage against everything, from the fate of her friend to the dangers being a voice for peace had meant for Padmé.

“I could feel your distress,” he whispered as a way of explanation when, finally calmer, she made a small movement of head to ask about his timely rescue. She felt a burst of gratitude. People were watching them and there would be endless talks about the Jedi who had danced with that Senator from Naboo, but she couldn’t regret it.

After that, she danced with Fang Zar, then with Bail Organa, Danu,Concorkill and three others Vurk whose name she couldn’t remember but was sure had worked with Padmé lately. Her small talk was impeccable but she found the entire ordeal more difficult than usual and never stopped watching for her Jedi bodyguard from the corner of her eyes.

Since he had taken the woman they thought was Senator Amidala for a spin on the dance floor, Senators seemed to think that Obi-Wan was the exception in the habits of Jedi to play wall flowers, and she saw him cornered by a few of them. He always refused and stood on the limits of the dance floor, his eyes on her.

They came back late to the apartment and her fellow handmaidens helped her shed her disguise, layer after layer, giving her back her breath. When Gregar knocked on the door to ask what they wanted for dinner, Ellé stepped outside to give him a coded, secret message from the Senator and Dormé and Motée stayed alone.

When Motée attacked the tight lacing of the outer corset, Dormé asked

“You were already in the Senator’ service during the invasion, yes?”

“Yes, I was selected in the first batch of trainees. I entered her retinue just before the coronation. Stars, it’s stuck, I’m half of the idea to cut that one,” Motée replied.

“Did you meet the Jedi?” Dormé continued, pursuing her idea.

“Yes, of course. But I wasn’t in the ship that went to Coruscant. When those slimy slugs tried to take the Queen prisoner and the Jedi rescued her, I was in the infirmary with the Veruna flu. At the time, I was furious to have missed all the excitement,” Motée answered, before adding

“Don’t judge me too harshly, I was young.”

“So, the Jedi?”

“Ah, yes. I met the younger, Knight Kenobi. Of course at the time he wasn’t a Knight like now,” and a shadow passed on her face.

She stood up, freeing Dormé from the corset and putting it in it’s place on the display of corsets in the wardrobe before coming back to the other handmaiden and kneeling to start on the small mother of pearl buttons of the inner robe.

“I was still in the infirmary, helping with the wounded in fact, when Padawan Kenobi brought his Master’s body, I suppose with the Force’s help because that poor, dear man had been some sort of giant, almost as tall as a Wookie. Kenobi had refused anybody’s help. I will never forget the expression on his face.”

“He has a better poker face right now,” Dormé said to drive away that sorrowful expression that the evocation of the past had put on her friend’s face, “because I’m pretty sure the aid from Senator Drake, ah, what’s his name, the one with the unfortunate piercing that Sabé once mentioned  neutering?”

“Stiu Csib, damn him. A shame he’s not part of our delegation, I would ask for his demise so fast….”

“Yes, that one. Pretty sure he tried to pinch our dear Jedi’s rump and Obi-Wan sidestepped that like he had the training Panaka gave us against those sort of idiots,”

“Perhaps the Jedi had a seminar about that too. Also, Knight Kenobi’s ass is the first thing you see when he take off that horrible cloak,” Motée giggled, and for a moment, there was something cheerful in the air, their grief, sorrows and concerns pushed aside.

The autopsy’s report, delayed by some sort of bureaucratic non-sense, had come during the party and Gregar, Obi-Wan and Dormé started examining it together once Dormé was dressed as herself again. The other handmaidens had gone to bed, they would have the night shift. There was food on the table but the details of the autopsy had stopped them from finishing it.

“It’s a big bunch of non-sense and I would have done better with a nail file to open up the body and an anatomical encyclopaedia on my holopad to study it,” Dormé declared, despair in her voice. She had hoped that this time, they could find something to use to discover who wanted so badly the Senator’s life to end.

“Please, don’t speak about opening dead bodies like that. But no, there is not a lot of exploitable information. I hoped for so much better,” Gregar, more diplomatic than his lover, answered.

“I deeply regret the Judicials refused the offer of help from the Jedi Temple in that matter. With the Force, our Healers could perhaps have found something more,” Obi-Wan remarked.

“Well, this day was totally unhelpful,” she declared, standing up, “I’m going to bed,” and she bowed to the Jedi.

“Thank you for your help, Obi-Wan. I appreciated you being as mindful of my distress as my physical safety,” she added.

He stood up too, bowing deeply in return.

“Good night, Dormé, and it was a pleasure. You’re a great dancer”

“Do you need something? I assure you, we can prepare you a room, instead of having you sleep on that stone calling itself a sofa in the living room.”

“It’s perfect like that. I don’t plan to really sleep. Meditation doesn’t need a bed.”

Dormé and Gregar retired for the night, leaving the Jedi alone in the living room. Later, when they were preparing for bed, she asked her lover

“What do you think of Obi-Wan?”

“Smart, meticulous. Ridiculous hair that he manages to make look stylish. Doesn’t miss a lot of what is happening in a room, he was like a mountain hawk in that ballroom. I don’t know about his gift in the Force, but he would do a good member of the Security Force. Why?”

He caught something of her thought in the shape of her mouth. She never had understood how he could read her so quickly.

“Bad idea, my love. Terrible idea. He’s not exactly a shopkeeper or a librarian we can bring back from one of your favourite clubs for a night.”

She kissed his cheek, just below his eye patch. His skin was still smelling of his hair removal lotion. She was of the opinion that it was very telling of a man if he shaved or removed his beard in the morning or in the evening. Gregar did both. In the morning because he wanted to present the face of a perfect professional. In the evening because he wanted to spare her beard burns and his beard grew quickly. She sighed, caressing his cheek. Would Obi-Wan’s beard be groomed with lotions enough to spare her beard burns?

“I know…I just…I think he’s a good person and leaving him alone in the living room just seemed so lonely for him when I have you with me here.”

He turned his head,kissing  her on the mouth gently.

“We can’t take in our bed every lonely person on Coruscant. And that would make our conjoined mission awkward  if he doesn’t do that sort of thing.”

“You’re right and I’m being an idiot.”

“You’re being a wonderful, compassionate person and that’s one of the many, many reasons I love and adore you.”

A smile, still a little timid, bloomed on Dormé’s lips.

“Many? Tell me more?” And Gregar went into the details of what he named ‘ _her glamorous figure and killer mind_ ’ until she was half giggling, half aroused, and forgetting the lonely figure in the living room. Instead, she tackled him to their bed, earning herself a laugh and a protestation that he was too old for such vigorous preliminaries, and stripped him of his underwear, his last piece of clothes.

The next morning, Dormé stayed inside, since she wasn’t officially on Coruscant right now, and Amidala had no engagement that day that she needed to carry out. She used that reclusion time to pen a long letter to Meena Tills. Even if she couldn’t talk about the last evening, it was good to keep up. She then went back to studying the impressive mass of documents they were trying to decipher.

Obi-Wan and Gregar went to try to track the kouhuns. The arthropods were a well-known method of assassination but that didn’t mean they were easy to find. A quick access to the Holonet had confirmed what Gregar remembered from his training: poisonous was the first word that came to mind about their homeworld. There was a market for those sort of horrors, an ambitious heir in need of money only had to ask the right person, and Obi-Wan and Gregar both had contact in the under levels.

If the would-be killer’s autopsy had given nothing, her weapons perhaps would  bring something.

Obi-Wan’s first idea for their investigation was a diner in CoCo Town.

" _The best eats in the CoCo Town streets_ " was the advertisement on the door and the moment they were inside, a gigantic Besalik engulfed Obi-Wan in a hug. On a greasy chair, Gregar drank the best caf he ever had, flirted with a charming blond waitress, ate an awful slice of cake as greasy as the chair, and let the Jedi convince his friend to give them a name.

When Obi-Wan went into the Besalik’s office to send a discreet transcription to the Jedi Temple, the cook saw Gregar’s watch him.

“You should do it,” he said, surprising the Captain.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Obi-Wan is too stressed and his Padawan doesn’t help. Teenager humans are the worst of your species. Obi-Wan could benefit from a good night.”

“Is he aware that you’re encouraging strangers to bed him?”

“He would be terribly embarrassed. I have know him since he was little more than a tadpole, all gangly limbs.”

“That seems like a good reason to not push him into my bed.”

“He wouldn’t have brought you here if he didn’t trust you. And he never smiles anymore.”

A big sigh rattled his massive frame.

“Since his Master’s death….” He shook his head.

“Sex isn’t a magic cure,” Gregar remarked, not without gentleness.

“No, but reducing his stress levels is probably the only thing you can do for him. Unless you can resolve the Separatist Crisis or help little Ani’s ego to deflate.”

“…”

A big hand patted Gregar on the shoulder twice.

“Take care of my friend if blasters start to sing, Captain. Contrary to the legends, Jedi are quite mortal,” the Besalik finished, then he went back to his kitchen, his steps slow and almost defeated.

Following the trail of the first name given to them by the cook, they found a second name, then a third.

Every day they went in search of intelligence about their investigation, lower and lower into Coruscant’s levels. Obi-Wan was quite an interesting view dressed like a spacer, playing sabbac in seedy bars. _And he was cheating_. Not even with the Force but so well that Gregar had needed three days to understand it.

“Who taught you that!” he had asked, aghast.

“My friend Quinlan,” and Obi-Wan had smiled, in a way that could only be described as flirtatious. “You should see yourself, my dear Gregar. You look like the elderly aunt of a holonovel who found her beloved niece in bed with a Wookie. Jedi aren’t the paragon of virtue you seem to believe and when it’s useful to the mission or to the persona of our pretended identity, we cheat.”

Gregar shook his head, amused, and observed him with a new regard. Slouching in his seat, a bottle of something strong in his hands, Obi-Wan could pass for one of the native of the lower levels, or perhaps simply for a drunk mercenary like so many other, if people didn’t watch his eyes too much, piercing and hard in a way that was rare. He looked so different from the man that he saw every evening when Obi-Wan played bodyguard to Dormé impersonating Amidala. But neither of those were probably the real Obi-Wan Kenobi.

When they went back to the apartment, Gregar put again his Captain’s uniform, Obi-Wan dressed himself in his crispest Jedi tunics and they played bodyguard for Dormé-playing-Padmé. The Jedi made himself quiet and unobtrusive in a way so efficient that people forgot he was in the room. Only once, when they had been waiting for Gregar and their air car, Dormé had seen him drop that act, when he had intervened to protect a young waitress who had accidentally spilled a whole tray of drinks onto a wealthy, aggressive idiot’s cloak. Suddenly, he had seemed to fill the entire room and the fire in his eyes put to shame the red flame of his hair that Dormé always half wanted to touch.

“Aren’t you bored of watching people chat and dance in my shadows?” Dormé asked one evening, when she was filling three glasses with some liquor, after a particularly tiring ball.

“I’m here to serve and there is no shame in a mission of protection. The life of a Jedi isn’t all the explosions and mysterious killer-planets the latest holo-novels want you believe.” He smiled, more natural every day with them.

“It’s still a shame,” She remarked, “Your performance as a dance partner is much better than most of them. We should have the Senator’s shoes reinforced- I can’t believe the numbers of people who stepped on my foot tonight.”

He laughed, raising his glass in silent thanks, and when she put on some music and called Gregar and the other maidens, he accepted one dance from every one of them before retiring for the night, letting them just to be Nubian  people.

The Senate was still debating the bill of the Military Creation Act. Senators tearing each other apart viciously and everyone seem stuck waiting, like  the moments just before a summer storm,  waiting for the first strike of lighting. Sometimes Dormé wanted to make them pay for their behaviour, they were supposed to be better than that, but calling the vote too fast would also put them at risk to lose it.

Every three days they contacted Naboo on a heavily encrypted terminal. The Senator’s news was good: she seemed to get all the much needed sleep she had lost on working against the Military Creation Act, but they weren’t any closer to solving the identity of her enemies.  Obi-Wan’s Padawan wasn’t on Naboo with her anymore. He had apparently run to his homeworld and while Dormé hadn’t exactly caught why he left, Padmé Amidala was now guarded by a blue Jedi Twil’ek and the Padawan was on probation at the Temple, brought back by the scruff of his neck by another Jedi.

Dormé had tactfully tried to ask if Obi-Wan wanted to go back to the Temple but he had answered that Anakin being on probation meant even he couldn’t see him.

The frustration was gaining ground in Gregar and Dormé’s minds and probably in Obi-Wan’s too, stuck on an investigation that wasn’t working,  in addition to not being able to help his Padawan; he was only better at pretending. Every night the two lovers burned that frustration in each other’s arms, finding strength in their love, reinventing in their sheets a symphony of lust and desire. Since Dormé was still supposed to be on Naboo, they didn’t dare go out together to a club to find a third, which had been their favourite method of relaxation in the most stressing periods.

“You could go without me, one night,” Dormé had proposed one evening, when she was observing Gregar massaging cream around his dead eye to help with the skin irritation the patch was causing and to prevent chaffing.

“It’s not exactly a third if you’re not there. Why would I sleep with strangers without you?”

“One of us would be more relaxed.”

He kissed her frown then stole a small kiss from her lips.

“An evening reviewing files with you and Obi-Wan will be quite enough for me.”

“You’re getting attached,” Dormé remarked.

“He’s quite a personality and I like his dry humour. But I won’t forget that he will leave.”

She let her nightdress slip onto the floor and his thoughts immediately derailed. She wasn’t wearing underwear and she was covered in glitters, for whatever reason had crossed her mind.

“Too bad for him. Now enough talk about him. Or do I need a third to interest you?” And discussion about Obi-Wan had been forgotten for the night in the never ending love that they shared.

“That would still be nice,” she had added the next morning, when he was getting dressed and she was sharpening her favourite knife, kneeling naked on their bed. She was in the habit to hide it into her hair and the third attempt murder on the Senator had been prevented only by said knife and by Dormé’s quick action. It was just a shame that dead would-be assassin didn’t talk: her reflexes had been to search for the heart and she wasn’t in the habit to miss.

“That would still be nice to have him for a few days and I think that could be good for him too. He’s very lonely,” she had added after a time, before blowing a kiss to Gregar when he had left the bedroom to fetch Obi-Wan and start again their inquiries.

Their investigation about Zam Wessel’s arthropods brought them finally to the seediest place Gregar had ever visited. He was pretty sure the two Rhodians four tables from theirs were engaging in some sort of sex act and he had seen from the corner of his eyes three occurrences of what he was sure was drug dealing. Next to Gregar, Obi-Wan was staring down a known supplier of those poisonous and gruesome arthropods that Gregar had started to see in his dreams.

The ginger human was staring at the arms’ dealer, not with the meaningful, inquisitive look Gregar would have thought a Jedi would possess, just intense, really intense staring like he was trying to read something on the inside of the female Abednedo’s skull, but it was working.

Her mouth tendrils were getting more agitated every second, a sure sign in that species. Soon, she was speaking...and she knew next to nothing. Yes, she had sold the arthropods, but what she knew about the departed and not so much regretted Zam Wessel wasn’t what would put them on track of the masterminds of all that mess.

“It was useless,” Obi-Wan complained when they were back in the crowded streets. As always in the lower levels, the smell was pretty intense but Gregar could have sworn it wasn’t the reason of the rare manifestation of frustration of the Jedi. The ginger man was disguised that day and he was wearing his cloak closed to hide his Jedi uniform and with the hood up, Gregar could only see the fiery beard and the frown around the mouth.

“Come,” he said on impulse, putting his hand on the man’s back. The Jedi let him, followed without a word and for a second Gregar was sure Obi-Wan had pushed into his hand like a feline asking to be pet.

He took him to a small street booth where he bought him a portion of some soup, a blue, spiced thing that had been once, long ago, an Outer Rim’s speciality but could now be found everywhere in the Republic. They ate in silence, tired and hungry, then rose up a few levels into the city and Gregar searched for a bar that didn’t look like it had been a crime scene in the last twenty hours, differentiating it  in that from the latest they had visited. He asked the server droid for two drinks, following Obi-Wan to a booth and searched for his words

“I wanted to talk about Dormé and myself.”

The Jedi did a good impression of helpless animal stuck into a speeder’s lights but as always he recovered quickly from his surprise.

“I must confess I’m slightly startled. You know more about Jedi than most people do. What made you think I could be of use for  advice?”

“I’m not asking for  advice. Even if I did, well, you’re trained in negotiations, you would probably manage. Brokering a peace between two warmongering planets seems a little more complicated than between two people.”

“I’m confused, now. If not for relationship advice…”

“Dormé and I are in a relationship, but we are not in a monogamous relationship.”

The Jedi didn’t answer but Gregar could see attention in his piercing grey eyes.

“Most people like to define that with the two members of the relationship pursuing other love interest in the same time, everybody being in the discussion about it, and it’s fine, but this isn’t how we define ourselves. Sometimes, we like to go together in a club and to bring back a third. Sometimes it’s only for a night, sometimes for a few. Sometimes they have become friends that we see sometimes, for sex or simply for a meal.”

“I understand.” Obi-Wan interrupted him.

“You do? Perfect,” Gregar exclaimed, a big smile blossoming on his lips, until Obi-Wan continued:

“I will sleep in the Temple tonight to let you have the apartment for you and your third.”

“That is so  not what I was trying to explain…” Gregar complained before taking a sip from his Norvanian Grog.

He observed Obi-Wan. Had the other man really no idea Dormé and Gregar desired him?

“I thought it would be easier for you to speak about that just with me and not with the two of us. And in a public place such as bar rather than in the apartment. Not because I don’t want you to come home tonight, but because Dormé and I would like to share that with you and perhaps it will be less awkward if you aren’t interested if we have a little time before the evening super.”

Obi-Wan was as red as it was possible to be for a human being and he flinched when their gazes meet, immediate deciding to examine the table instead.

“Are you…Just to be sure I understand correctly- are you proposing I join you and your lover tonight?”

Three Rodians, already pretty drunk, passed their table, speaking too loud and laughing, and Gregar waited for them to be a little further in the room before starting again,

“I’m proposing we speak about it, the three of us, if you’re interested. And if you aren’t, I’m proposing we never speak about it with you again- we are not in the habit to insist if it isn’t an enthusiastic yes.”

Obi-Wan was still so red it was bordering on unhealthy. How did his body function if all his blood was on his face? Gregar’s hands were clenched so hard on his glass that it was painful. He had had this discussion before, with other people, but Obi-Wan had become their friend in those last few weeks and it was more important that it ever had been.

“Are you? Uninterested, I mean.”

Obi-Wan shifted slightly on his chair.

“No. I’m not uninterested,” and he met Gregar’s gaze, still red-faced but without flinching this time. Something greedy shivered on Gregar’s nerves as he let the desire he had tried so hard to curve surface again.

The next morning, Gregar was the first to wake up. His thirst won against the idea of staying in bed longer with the sweet warmth of the two bodies next to his and he tiptoed out of the bedroom, sidestepping an abandoned brown boot and one of Dormé’s stockings.

After a quick shower, he ventured into the apartment. It was still early, only the two night guards seemed awake yet and when they had assured him nothing had happened, he send them home and started breakfast. Like all Nubians, he didn’t understand the taste that the rest of the galaxy had for caf or tea, preferring local herb and berry infusions, but a little rummaging through the kitchen produced some of the galaxy’s most acclaimed beverages for their guest. When he had drank his first cup of infusion, he went back to the bedroom to convince his bed partners to wake up. Obi-Wan had apparently showered and put on his tunic. He was sitting on the bed when Gregar opened the door and he looked so human, so accessible, sitting there on that bed where the three of them had joined together, wearing only his inner tunic, which was slipping off of a shoulder, and looking at him, a small smile on his lips…

For a moment, a moment as clear as crystal in his heart, Gregar felt something like regrets for the things that never would be. He could have loved this man and he knew enough about his lover to know Dorme and Obi-Wan could have been a good match on the long term too, if they weren’t destined to share only these few nights. However, he was too smart to let _What if_ poison his mind and he pushed that sentiment aside.

“There is berry infusion and flat bread with Nubian seaweed jelly. Or caf and tea, if those are more your taste.”

“The red sort of seaweed jelly?” Obi-Wan asked, his smile more pronounced.

“We know how to treat lovers well, of course it’s the red sort.” Gregar couldn’t resist any longer and he leaned down, slowly, to see how Obi-Wan would react. The Jedi was the one closing the distance for a good morning kiss, short but sweet. If the ones shared last night had been heated, almost all consuming, this one was sweet and pleasing, like coming home at the end of long and tiring day. Gregar sat down next to him and turned his attention to the hill of covers that was, probably, Dormé. Only dark hairs were visible on the top. He pushed said hill with an enquiring finger.

“Breakfast, my little _resovia._ ”

He saw Obi-Wan’s curiosity and explained. “It’s a small bird, from Naboo’s wooded lowlands. It’s black and blue and cute.”

“Very Dormé.”

“It’s also carnivorous, mostly large insects and small lizards. And it impales them on plants’ thorns, as some sort of larder.”

“Very Dormé too. And so romantic.” Obi-Wan was laughing and patted the hill.

“I’m hungry.” He proclaimed to it.

The hill grunted.

“Not a morning person?” Obi-Wan asked.

“She once pulled a blaster on me. Pretty sure she would have used it, too.”

When Obi-Wan threw back his head to laugh, Gregar felt again that little pinch in the heart region and, wisely, he swept  the Jedi out of the bed before he tried to convince him they could take their morning and stay here, between the sheets, just the three of them.

Food.

Food and then duty.

When Dormé finally emerged from the bedroom half an hour after, dressed as a handmaiden and ready for the day, she found them deep into the datapads, a perfect picture of their first days of investigation…minus the fact that Obi-Wan, his hair carefully done, his clothes perfectly in place, was barefoot, his feet on Gregar’s lap. She served herself some infusion, claimed two kisses, hoisted herself into a chair and went to work too.

She had read so many holopads those last weeks, since Padmé had been sent to safety that she was seeing gruesome holopics in her sleep, but it didn’t seem it would be enough. Soon, the Senator would need to come back and they still didn’t have anything.

Oh, they had some results. In their long research, they had found things that weren’t tied to the present situation but had still been unsolved, unresolved, or even not known. Obi-Wan had accidentally uncovered a money laundering scheme, Gregar had solved a three years old murder that had been classified before as an accident and Dormé herself had send a package of data to Judicials that would probably be the end of some Senators little arrangements with the law and the beginning of their careers as inmates.

Other opponents to the Military Creation Act hadn’t had Padmé’s luck and the three of them had started to investigate their deaths in search of clues. With a sigh, she opened  her holopad to their latest attempt to track the money on the murder of an aid of Senator Organa. The Alderaanian’s investigation had been without success but perhaps with what they had learned…Senator Amidala had only one engagement that day, she was supposed to be on appearance in a charity gala. When they went home, she saw Obi-Wan hesitate, his stance hard and unyielding, more stone than man.

“You’re not in any obligation,” she reminded him, “but if you want, I would be happy to have your help in taking down this tent pretending to be a dress.” Something softened in him and he took her hand and followed her and Gregar into their bedroom again.

Unrest growing in the Republic, Padawan on probation and possible attempt’s on Dormé’s life because of their scheme apart, it was a good period for them. The days in the under levels were hard  work for Obi-Wan and Gregar, but hard work for important reasons and in good company can be a reward in itself. The evenings were full of long, too long parties where Dormé played her role and her two lovers watched her, Obi-Wan in plain sight, his face the emotionless mask she know understood to be a shield, Gregar from the shadows.

And the nights? The nights were theirs.

In the nights, there was breathless laughter and the rough edge of pleasure taking them away from their problems, even if just for a moment. There were Dormé’s heels   weighing on Obi-Wan and her nails in his back, there were hungry kisses and intense moments, and there was the simple comfort of a shoulder under their heads. There was the broken sound of Obi-Wan when he yielded under Gregar, safe to let go with them, and the smile of Dormé when the two men kissed her awake in the morning, whispering sweet nothing against her skin.

Life was difficult but with its rewards. Later, Dormé and Gregar would remember it as fond memories, a lot of little moments that seemed so simple.

Trust and friendship had already been there, they wouldn’t have invited someone they worked with into their bed without them, it wasn’t the same as a stranger they would not see again. There was a risk to it, but intimacy breeds another level of trust.

Once, when Dormé had found the Senators particularly tedious and tiresome, she hadn’t hesitated in roosting herself in Obi-Wan’s lap in the shuttle when going home, stealing his lips and attacking his pants.

“Gregar!” Obi-Wan had protested, because it was the first time it wasn’t the three of them.

“Just keep a little energy for me when we get home.” The Captain had joked from the pilot’ seat, before obscuring the windows of the shuttle to be sure there would be not _Senator Amidala rides a Jedi_ scandal the next morning in the news. The sounds had been extremely motivating to get home quick he had discovered, and when the shuttle had been safely docked, he had simply joined them in the back.

Not that he would do it again; he was getting too old to frolic in vehicles and he had felt it three days in his back, until Obi-Wan had given him the most wonderful and probably Force-enhanced massage.

This could have lasted a long time, until the Temple had needed Obi-Wan again. Or perhaps until his Padawan had finished his probation and they had deemed it unnecessary to keep him away from the young man longer, helping in an investigation that wasn’t  bearing results.

One morning, as Gregar and Obi-Wan had disappeared into the under levels once again, Dormé was busy with the reports about the disappearance of a holonews reporter from Naboo when the coms buzzed. She almost didn’t answer. Something in that datapad was bugging her and she couldn’t put her finger on why.

There was something…There was something wrong, there was a piece that didn’t fit in the puzzle, something that her brain  saw but which hadn’t gone all the way into her mind.

“Is this the result from being paranoid?” She was speaking to herself, now, great.

“No, no, something doesn’t fit.” She put the holopad down on the table, quite hard, surprising herself with the noise it made.

The damned communicator buzzed again and with a sigh, she took the call. It was one of the Chancellor’s secretaries and Dormé put on her best neutral expression. Handmaidens or senatorial aides were supposed to be nice little cogs in the Republic machine,  not people wanting to throw their comms out of the window.

Apparently the Chancellor wanted to see Senator Amidala, to try building bridges between her factions and the other.

“He’s always trying but the pro-war’s side is always winning- he doesn’t try hard enough,” Dormé grumbled, before asking for her friends’ help to dress.

When her skirt fell on the floor, on her left hip was a small bruise wherei one of her lovers had gripped too tight in a moment of passion, last night, or perhaps the night before when Obi-Wan had pushed her against the wall of the bedroom, Gregar giving them orders from the bed with a breathless voice. Motée had a small, angry sound when she saw the bruise.

“The Knight is spending too much time in your bed,” she said her lips tight, before helping her into Amidala’s dress, a dark one with too many ornamentations.

“It’s the first time you’re against one our lovers. I thought you appreciate him? I saw you two laugh together at dinner yesterday.”

“I like him fine. But it has been weeks and Gregar and you have never kept someone so long. Won’t it be difficult to let him go?”

Dormé touched her friend’ shoulder.

“You’re always trying to protect me.”

“Well, I’m the oldest of the girls with Sabé away. Who will shield you if I don’t?”

Dormé kissed her brow, even if it was difficult with the complicated headdress she was now wearing.

“You’re a good friend. And we always knew we wouldn’t keep him.”

“But you will still have each other. Who will he have?”

“Are you worried about him or us?”

“Perhaps all of you. The matters of the hearts can be as lethal as playing body doubles to the Senators.”

Dormé kissed her brow again and said nothing more and went to cover her face in enough paint to hide her identity.

“I’m coming the Captain and the Jedi,” Ellé said.

“No need. I’m only going to the Senate to have a chat with the Chancellor. You and Motée, it will be enough, the riskier thing will be those horrible biscuits he’s always trying to fed people.”

“Typho won’t like that.”

“What they’re doing is too important to bother them with bodyguard duty. You’re as competent as Gregar is. You’re even better in hand to hands!”

“It will be like old time. Just us handmaiden,” Ellé suddenly yielded and the three of them laughed.

At the same hour, in the under levels, Obi-Wan abruptly stooped walking, his eyes searching what they could see from the sky, his face tense, the lines around his mouth hard.

“Ben?” His companion asked, a few seconds after, when the Jedi didn’t move again.

“Ben?”

Nothing, just lost eyes searching for something, in a face that had gone paler, an exploit with his fair skin.

“I have a bad feeling,” he finally answered after another moment of silence, and he had totally lost the rough Mandalorian accent that he was affecting ten minutes ago as Ben.

“We’re going back, now,” he ordered and he threw his arm around Gregar’s waist.

“Don’t tense, I won’t let you fall.”

“Fall from wh-“

The rest of the sentence was lost in some truly epic swearing as Obi-Wan threw them bodily across the railing of the street as if Gregar’s weighted nothing, jumping from walls to walls as he was some sort of elastic ball and not a simple human, his arm like an iron-brand around the Captain’s waist.

They touched down next to one of the elevators, which had been three stories and almost four kilometres from their initial position, and Obi-Wan pushed him into it, then pushed the button and released his grip. Only then did Gregar move away from him, first to lose his lunch on the floor of the elevator, then he turned around again to express, in chosen words, what he thought of the latest moments.

He didn’t even go three words into his rant when he saw Obi-Wan’s expression better. 

His lover had gone full Jedi, and it seemed strange with the spacer’s tunics and rough leather pants he was wearing. No disguise in the world could have hidden the posture, the tension, the power that was crackling in the air, a power habitually contained in the flesh of Obi-Wan Kenobi and now sizzling in the atmosphere with such strength that even Gregar, as Force Sensitive as a Assorhan moth, felt the small hairs on his neck stand up.

This was a predator, insisted the more ancient part of his brain, and human ran confronted with such a creature.

He gritted his teeth, took a long breath, another one, and touched Obi-Wan’s shoulder, trying to capture his attention, his voice low.

“Are you alright?” He bit his lips, feeling himself stupid. What sort of question was that?

“We need to go back. Something terrible…something terrible will happen if we don’t go back.”

“The Senator? Do we need to contact Naboo?”

“I…I don’t know, I can’t be more precise.”

“I’m coming Dormé, she will contact the lake residence from the apartment’s terminal and tell Knight Secura to take the Senator and run.”

Domé didn’t answer her com and Gregar swore again, viciously. He had invoked in vain more gods in the last twenty minutes than he had the last twenty years. When the elevator brought them to the highest level it was reaching, they took another, then another, then rushed to the apartment.

It was empty.

The Captain consulted immediately the terminal, saw the communication from the Senate.

“Do you think…”

“I don’t know,” Obi-Wan insisted, his voice tight.

“I’m taking the hover bike and speeding to the Senate, if the danger is with Dormé,” the Captain decided, “Come the Jedi guarding the Senator and tell her to take Amidala away from Naboo, in case the danger is about her. That should cover our bases. And then I’m docking Dormé and the other pay until they learn caution!” and then he ran out of the door.

Later, he would regret not having given a last kiss to Obi-Wan in that moment. Before running to your death, shouldn’t you kiss someone you appreciate and have a few, meaningful words, not resentful one against a lover, even a lover without enough consideration for her own safety?

Against the dusk, the dome of the Senate was looming like a malevolent shape and he abandoned his over bike without even stopping the motor, running inside.

Arriving to the Chancellor’s office, he had to force his door against a small army of secretaries. One even tried to shoot him to stop him from entering, but the Captain was a veteran of the battle of Naboo and a difficult man to subdue. His lover was perhaps in mortal danger, as herself or as Amidala…Even the Chancellor was perhaps in danger and the old man was supposed to be the only thing between the galaxy and the war.

Instead of a successor of Zam Wessel menacing the Chancellor and a supposed Senator, like he thought he would find, in that office he found two bodies dressed as handmaiden on the floor and Palpatine, his face distorted by rage, electricity running from his fingertips.

And Dormé, his beloved, adored Dormé, the woman he had pledge to love until their death, on the floor, convulsing, a grotesque puppet lost in the clothes of Amidala.

The Captain saw red and draw his weapon.

He was an excellent shoot, but no blaster boolts touched Palpatine, and no one of them even came close. When the lightning touched Gregar, right on the chest, he lost foot, crashed onto the floor yelling. No pain compared to that, not even the pain from his head wound all those years ago, when he had lost his eye.

He heard another yell and there was a powerful sound, like a hiss, the sound hundreds of angry, murderous insects would have made, then yelling again. He opened his eyes with difficulties and saw two silhouettes brandishing bars of light against each other, moving so fast he couldn’t follow. He fought against the dark that was trying to swallow him but he was losing foot. The last thing he saw was Palpatine, triumphant, leaning over a beige shape on the floor and laughing, laughing and the sound grated against his very soul.

Then he knew no more.

For a time, he floated in void, then conscience came again, as immediate as if a switch had been pushed.

Confused, Gregar tried to sit up, only to discover he was too dizzy and disorientated for such a simple act.

“You’ve been hurt. Don’t move. You’re safe, you’re drugged to the gills but I’m there and a Jedi Healer is coming,” It was Obi-Wan’s voice, but stripped of a layer of his usual calm, more pressing and urgent.

The Captain groaned, pitching his head forward, like he was curling around his wound on the chest. He fought to blink away the dark encroaching his vision and found Obi-Wan’s face. The other man was panting, his colour grey, with droplets of sweat on his face and his eyes were suspiciously brilliant.

 “You’re feverish. How can you be feverish so fast? Electric shocks shouldn’t make you feverish,” Obi-Wan whispered, his hand on a heated cheek. There were some other voices in the room and Gregar saw a Togruta with the uniform of the Senate medical personal, leaning down on Dormé. The medic was helping her sat down and Gregar’s heart almost burst to know her alive.

“Don’t move,” Obi-Wan repeated, his voice like distorted.

Gregar fell unconscious again, with half the idea he would never wake up and that it wasn’t such a terrible death, to die like that, sure Dormé was alive, and with Obi-Wan’s hand against his forehead and his voice in his ears. He only hoped Dormé would find love again.

His mind was plagued by nightmares where he never arrived in time in the Senate and where that horrible laugh of Palpatine followed him everywhere.

When he finally woke up again, it was in his own bed and he needed a few minutes to recognize the grey volutes adorning the ceiling. He was alive, of that he was sure: he was feeling too bad for that to be the afterlife.

Dormé was asleep and curled around his back as if she could protect him from the nasty nightmares the fever and the drugs brought on. Her smaller hand was pressing his own and he felt her breath against his neck.

Obi-Wan and a Moon Calamari dressed in Jedi-beige were sitting next to the door, sipping tea silently and they smiled to him peacefully. Obi-Wan stood up and came to give him water.

“What…” Gregar’s voice was almost unrecognizable. He took another sip of water and it was like finding an oasis in the middle of the desert. He felt in desperate need of a shower but was pretty sure his legs wouldn’t bear his weigh.

“You will be fine,” Obi-Wan whispered. “You only need time and sleep now. We’ll explain everything when you’re feeling better.”

Gregar moistened his lips and spoke again, his voice more firm “The Chancellor?”

“Dead.”

“Good.”

“Motée? Ellé?”

Obi-Wan’s expression grew dark.

“Motée is dead. I’m sorry.”

The Jedi’s hand caressed his cheek and Gregar’s eyes started closing themselves, despite his best efforts. Dormé was slightly snoring and the pain was muted by probably an entire drawer of pills. Sleep claimed him again and that time there were no nightmares.

It took him a long time to be awake enough to untangle what had happened in the Senate. Reality swam in and out of his conscience and he forgot things people had already said to him several times.

A week after, when he had been finally coherent for a whole hour, Senator Amidala, freshly disembarked from the ship from Naboo, Ellé, who was in a hoverchair, Knight Secura who had come from Naboo with the Senator, Obi-Wan and Dormé sat with him and explained to him the latest development and what had happened that terrible afternoon.

“Palpatine had started to pry your mind open like a nut when I arrived,” Obi-Wan had said, perhaps a little too honest about it for Gregar, who would shudder for years at the idea.

“That’s why you have difficulties. But it will pass. He wanted to know if Dormé was the only one to have made the connection between the murders of the anti-wars groups and himself. To know how much damage control he should do, in a way.”

“It’s greed. It’s always greed that damn that sort of men,” Dormé had stated, her voice dark. There were scaring on her beautiful face, memories from the lightning, the same scars that Gregar now had on his torso.

“He could have continue on his path to total power, if not for his greed,” she continued, “In the murder of the reporter from Naboo, the latest we were studying, something was bugging me. I only made the connection with the supposed accidental death of Palpatine’s brother, decades ago, when I was in his office. I wouldn’t have if I hadn’t studied it in the Academy, during training. I don’t know how he understood.”

“For those fluent in the Force, your shock must have been revealing,” Knight Secura interfered, not without gentleness in her tone. 

“I still can’t believe it was him, from the beginning,” and Senator Amidala was still incredulous, even one week after the revelation. “And to think he wouldn’t have been suspected if he hadn’t had his brother killed to keep the whole family’s fortune.”

“It was decades ago. He probably hadn’t built the connexions he had today with the banking clan: he probably used that money for his plan. The Judicials and the Jedi will need undoubtedly years to untangle everything from his machinations.” Knight Secura remarked.

“Or perhaps he just couldn’t imagine something to escape him. He wanted to consume everything, to have everything under his thumb,” Dormé insisted and Gregar took her hand.

“How…how did Motée die?”

There was some surprise on their faces.

“I’m sorry,” Dormé began again, “I hadn’t understood you were unconscious at that moment; I should have told you sooner.”

“She saved us,” Obi-Wan explained, “she saved everyone, everything. She was gravely hurt from the beginning, as Ellé was; and when I was losing to Palpatine…I was on the floor, he was laughing, and I had only the time to think I should have called the Temple before running to the Senate, and then I saw ten centimetres of iron erupting from his chest. He had been too busy with his joy to kill a Jedi to keep track of her.”

“She loved that dagger. It was a gift from Captain Panaka for her graduation from the Academy,” the Senator said, her voice wet.

“Palpatine never thought about us, the handmaiden, more than décor,” Dormé continued. “A stupid error for a man from Naboo. That will have been his downfall.”

“Did she…did she die from her wounds?”

“Apparently, Sith Lords explode upon their deaths and she was the closest.”

Finally, Gregar found tears, the reality catching up with his soul, and they let him alone with Dormé.

At the threshold, Obi-Wan gazed back at them a last time and Gregar would have bet his soul that without Senator Amidala and Knight Secura, he would have stayed with them in that moment.

Dormé’s started crying too and soon it was unstoppable, as they wept for their lost friend, their arms around each other, as they wept from grief, from fear that they could have lost each other too.

The next day the three of them watched on the holonet Senator Amidala and Senator Binks address the Senate, reading message from Queen Jamillia and Boss Nass to assure the galaxy that Naboo, neither Gungans nor human parts of it, had no ties to Palpatine’s machinations and that his actions were denounced by their two governments.

“Naboo’s politicians will be under suspicion for quite a long time,” Obi-Wan remarked, “I hope those two hadn’t ambitions to rise up one day to the Chancellor’s chair. The Naboo authorities will probably choose two new faces very fast as a way to make people forget quicker.”

“Who will take it? The Chancellor’s place I mean. I heard the entire staff under Palpatine had been arrested. A long time will be necessary to identify who knew everything, who knew parts of it, who was innocent and just unobservant.”

“Finnis Valorum had been called to act as acting chancellor for six months, to guide the peace talks and organize new elections. Since Palpatine had him destitute, he was deemed a safe choice.”

Later, that would once again seem important to Dormé and Gregar, but in that moment, huddled together in a sofa, it seemed secondary to Motée’s death.

Obi-Wan stopped the holonet’s transmission.

“I need to apologize to you two.”

Only twin gazes of surprise meet his own.

“Perhaps I would have perceived the danger Dormé were in sooner, if I hadn’t been…distracted.”

“Are you trying to apologize for saving my life when you had a bad feeling? Gregar would have arrived too late in the Senate if you hadn’t feel something off in the Force.”

“No, I…I should have felt it sooner. Perhaps the poor Motée could still be alive.”

Dormé and Gregar exchanged a significant glance, then took each one a hand of Obi-Wan and he finally stopped guilt-tripping…probably for a moment only.

“Thank you,” Dormé said, “and stop about Motée. She….She died a handmaiden of Naboo. Don’t try to take her agency away. If you must put the blame on someone, Palpatine is a way better choice.”

“Did the Jedi really ask for his body like Representative Binks said in his announce?”

“Yes. He will be burned in the Temple and the ashes dispersed by some of the Knights. Probably in several parts, some in an ocean, some in a sun…It’s tradition for a Sith. Technically, we are supposed to kill them ourselves too.”

“But the handmaiden was quicker.”

“I suppose we have a little soul-searching to do. He was just there, under our noses. And I’m not sure he wouldn’t have gotten away with our deaths if Motée hadn’t saved us.”

“He would have probably hurt himself and pretended our murderer had run.”

“Or that I had snapped, like my Padawan, and killed all of you and almost killed him. He would have seen his popularity rising and that would have been a good reason to narrow Jedi’s powers.”

“What? What did you say about your Padawan?”

“Anakin…Anakin did some terrible things when he left Naboo and the Senator. He was found by Knight Secura’s grandmaster and brought back to the Temple.”

“Oh Obi-Wan…”

Gregar pulled him between them onto the sofa, easing him slowly until Obi-Wan was huddled between them, smaller that he was supposed to be. The Captain was surprised and perhaps a little alarmed to feel the Jedi slightly trembling, a nervous tremor that didn’t want to stop.

“Will he be expulsed? From the Jedi Order I mean?”

“I don’t know. He’s under surveillance and meditating three times a day with Master Yoda and I can’t see him and I was supposed to raise him and protect him, I swore it to my Master. And…and…”

This time, the tears were Obi-Wan’s and the other two closed their arms around him, trying their best to offer comfort against the grief that was tearing him apart.

After a long, cathartic moment, Dormé, pragmatic, ordered take out and forced food into the two men which hadn’t the common sense to assure their sugar blood didn’t crash and darken their already horrible mood.

“I should go,” Obi-Wan protested after the last bite, when she tried to guide him into their bedroom.

“Can you see your Padawan tonight?”

“No.”

“Then perhaps, you should stay a little more. You will just think about him in the Temple, and Senator Amidala won’t be there before the middle of the night.”

“I can’t…I’m not exactly in the mood.”

“If you think we only like you for your body’s flexibility, I will be vexed.”

The three of them still had difficulties to move, memories of Palpatine’s lightning, but they huddled together under the cover until they didn’t know where they finished and the other started. In the dark, warm and safe against Dormé’s back, Gregar’s arms around the young women reaching to him, wearing a borrowed tunic with Gregar’s favourite podrace team logo, Obi-Wan admitted that it was the most peaceful he had felt in one week.

Anakin’s fate was still a bruise on his soul and he was avid to be admitted to see him, but for now he slept and didn’t dream.

The next morning with Dormé’s help, he collected the few things he had brought to the apartment in the beginning of this mission, almost a life ago in his mind.

“What will you do now?” he asked the handmaiden.

“If the queen asks for Senator Amidala’s resignation, and she probably will to quicken the Senate forgetting Sidious was from Naboo, Gregar will perhaps stay with the new Senator. And I will stay with him. As a private citizen, Padmé has no need for body double or handmaiden and I’m not interested at playing secretary half a galaxy away from my lover. But there is always interesting postings on Coruscant for someone trained in security.”

He had sad imitation of a smile.

“I will happy to know you’re together to weather that storm.”

“Motée was right about you,” Dormé answered.

He turned to her, surprised by the non-sequitur.

“About what?”

“It doesn’t matter. Just something she said to me her last morning. She was the smartest of us.”

Dormé was a tall women and with the heels she wore that morning, she kissed him without even having to reach higher. It was sweet, slow, a good bye kiss.

“Will you be sent on mission off world or will I perhaps see you in the Senate again?”

“I don’t know. It will depend on Anakin and how he will bounce back from what happened. Perhaps the Council will bench us, perhaps they will put us on relief mission, or perhaps they will expel us and we’ll work as farmers on one of the new colonies.”

“You too? They could expel you too?”

“They won’t, but I want to share his fate, whatever it will be. I’m responsible of him.”

“So perhaps we’ll never see each other again?”

“Perhaps.” And it didn’t seem to touch him as she was touched by that idea, and as she knew Gregar was. She kissed him again.

“May the Force be with you, Obi-Wan Kenobi.”

He left the apartment without looking back and on the docking bay, she saw Gregar kiss him too, and that seemed very intense.

Obi-Wan climbed into the air taxi and the vehicle took off, taking him out of their lives.

 

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[ART] Fanart for 'During that time on Coruscant...'](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14544726) by [Gabriel4Sam](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gabriel4Sam/pseuds/Gabriel4Sam), [rainbo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainbo/pseuds/rainbo)




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